Aman arrives at the hospital before the sun rises to make sure everything is in order. 

In a tightly packed room of some 25-30 custodial cleaning carts, he begins the solitary, loving work of preparing his team for the day ahead. With careful attention, he maneuvers the carts in back forward. These ones belong to his team. The evening and grave shift carts are parked in front. Aman slides in between them, moving one over, one back, one forward, not unlike the puzzling of a Rubik’s cube.

Lined up like yellow taxi cabs, Aman begins to take stock. Twenty blue cloths for surfaces. Twenty orange cloths for bathrooms. He refills cleanser containers for heavy duty cleaning, bathrooms, floors. Bleach for high touch areas. As each member of his crew arrives, some bleary eyed, some rushing, Aman greets each one by name and with a cart and a smile: “Good Morning;” “I’m glad you are here today;” “It’s good to see you.”  

On busy days, he and his team members clean about 14 rooms each, stripping linens, clearing out trash, dusting, sweeping, disinfecting surfaces, cords, and equipment, making beds, cleaning bathrooms, mopping floors. In that exact order. Operating rooms and rooms in Labor and Delivery need deeper cleaning. Isolation rooms are further disinfected with a UV robot.

He takes pride in his team and his work. “It is good for your mind, when you see a clean environment. It is reassuring and comforting, and this is good for the patients.” Occasionally patients leave words of thanks on the room’s whiteboard. “This makes me happy; it makes me want to do more.”

An app on Aman’s phone lets him know when rooms are completed, if a sudden mess needs attention, or to prioritize a room because a patient is waiting. Some requests are out of the ordinary, like when Aman has been called to catch a disoriented bird in the hospital with a large net. “You need to be careful, so you don’t hurt the bird.”

It’s on the same phone each day that he calls his 7-year-old daughter Hawan, which means “wish” in his mother tongue. She’s curious, tenacious, and head over heels about gymnastics. She’s his everything, Aman says. He hasn’t held her since she was 27 days old.

He and his wife met and married in Ethiopia just 11 months before he’d learn he was able to go to America, where he’s now a citizen. He left with the hope they could follow. He still hopes they can.

As Aman navigates the hospital, pitching in on cleaning rooms, checking on quality, stocking supply closets, he waves to the nurses in OB and fist bumps co-workers. “He brings playfulness and humor with him and keeps work filled with happiness,” says fellow team-lead Maria Romero.

“Everywhere I am, in Utah, in this hospital, there is kindness,” says Aman. People greet him with a smile here, turn towards him, ask how he’s doing. He bashfully admits he’s trying to learn Spanish to better engage with people at the hospital, alongside the five languages he already speaks.

As he walks down a wide empty hallway, cast in early morning rays. Aman spreads out his arms with pride, “I see that I am in paradise because of all the kindness here.”

Aman’s deep gratitude stems from hardship, forged by the violence and scarcity he experienced growing up in deep poverty in Ethiopia and during the 18 years he spent in a Kenyan refugee camp. “[The camp] is a hard place to have hope,” he says. “Now, I wake up each day and I want to be here; I am happy and safe here.”

Aman works another cleaning job after hours. But on the weekends, he takes long drives—often to Idaho where he buys lottery tickets—bringing Hawan along for the ride atop his dash. His happiness coexists with heartache. This is where he shows her the Wasatch mountains, fresh fallen snow, the leaves changing. Again and again, she says, “When I am coming, I’ll play in the snow with you. When I am coming, I’ll go to the mountains.”